BSU could have taken the top two prizes had it combined its two home security projects: Smart LockInterCom and e-Spy Mobile Security. On its own, the two projects were good but not good enough to break into the top three.

The home security project that won second place, Smart House, was better than the two BSU projects individually in that it offered both security (alarms, SMS notifications) and convenience (turning lights and appliances on and off through SMS).

CONTROLLED THROUGH SMS. The project model of Bulacan State University’s Smart LockInterCom. The system allows you to open and lock doors and windows using a Java application in your phone that provides a visual interface to the SMS commands. Click on photo to view larger image.

Smart LockInterCom allows people to open and close doors and windows in their houses using SMS. The team that created the system also created a Java application that simplifies the process in your cell phone. The Java application provides a visual representation of your house or office and you can just click on doors to either open or lock it. The application also indicates which doors are locked.

It is that Java application that differentiates the project from others like it. The second place winner, Systems Plus College Foundation, only created the security system and you had to control it by sending SMS codes.

Boy, I didn’t know I had it in me. I’m in Manila for the Smart Wireless Engineering Education Program finals, which formally opens today at the SM Mall of Asia. Last Wednesday, organizers decided to host a paintball competition for participants at Global Gutz (a name that takes the wimp out of anyone) and, for kicks, I joined.

LET’S GET IT ON. My team during the paintball tournament staged by Smart for Sweep participants. Click on photo to view larger image.

I was initially drafted into the Smart team, which eventually won the competition, but I switched sides when the game was about to start. A Smart team member who was assigned to another team asked to switch places with me, with the pledge he won’t shoot me on the field.

I was bent on staying as far back as I could and play sniper, which is what I do in Counterstrike. I do not have the heart of a Thermopylae warrior and was ready, as soon as we were overrun, to fire all my bullets and raise my hands to indicate I was out of ammo to get myself out of the game.

But there’s something about putting on a combat vest and mask. The enveloping threat of suffocation in soaring heat seems to unleash repressed demons.